


bite my tongue, bide my time

by firstaudrina



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 10:44:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17021190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firstaudrina/pseuds/firstaudrina
Summary: The thing was, Eliot had called dibs. And dibs were sacred.





	bite my tongue, bide my time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [stainofmylove (girljustdied)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/girljustdied/gifts).



> Set sometime in early/mid Season 1. Written for [this prompt](https://girljustdied.dreamwidth.org/256220.html?thread=7028956#cmt7028956).

The thing was, Eliot had called dibs. And dibs were sacred. 

Many a first year had perished under the combined attentions of Margo and Eliot. They cracked, they melted, they gave themselves up to the most delicious torture of being loved and left in the same weekend, sometimes the same hour. But occasionally Margo would see that brightness at the back of Eliot’s eyes that meant he had decided to be especially fond of one, so she steered clear. Personally, she didn’t get attached. 

Eliot got that look on his face for Quentin Coldwater, the most perpetually lost of puppies. Quentin, who once fumbled all his books out of his hands while he was standing completely still, who fell asleep sitting straight up in a chair most nights like a full-on dweeb, who might as well have curled up at the foot of Alice’s bed and prayed to get so much as a stray kick. Eliot picked him out and Margo wished him luck on the journey. Though unspoken, the dibs were clear and present, and she knew one day the combination of champagne and hair-in-eyes would be fatal. They would bone down with enthusiasm, and Margo would wipe a single tear from her eye with pride. 

But.

But she was only one woman.

In the morning she sat on the kitchen counter in a lace teddy, watching Quentin get so flustered by the mere suggestion of her nipples that he spilled coffee grinds everywhere trying to get them into the filter. But then he kind of laughed, more at himself than anything else, and that made Margo smile. “Is it because it’s cold in here? Would you be less stressed out if they weren’t looking back at you?”

“Uh…” Quentin glanced at her, then down, then back up again. “Maybe?”

“You’re an incorrigible flirt,” she declared, delighted, before twisting and flicking her fingers in such a way that all the grinds jumped up into a dark cloud and doused him. Something about him really made Margo want to pull his pigtails. Then pat him on the head. 

“Not really.” Unamused, he dusted himself off, admitting, “But if there’s another way to talk to you, then I don’t know what it is.” 

That was it. That right there. Scowling but soft-eyed, coffee in his hair, dark circles making it clear he’d spent another night sitting up with a book in his lap — 

It made it difficult to respect the sanctity of dibs. 

So Margo went fishing. She hooked a leg around his hips to reel him in, one marabou-topped mule clattering to the ground. Quentin’s eyes got big and his hands sort of hovered in no man’s land, palms-up; Margo’s own were firmly planted on the counter, keeping him in place with locked ankles and very toned calves, thank you. 

“Baby Q,” she cooed. “Don’t tell Eliot. He’ll be totally jealous.”

Then she tightened her legs so he slid a few inches closer and kissed him. It was no hands and all hair for a second, her big waves swinging into the way when she leaned in, his sad-boy side-bangs always covering one eye. But then, laughing, Margo pulled back to shake strands out of her face and cupped his cheeks, held him firmly in her hands and kissed him again. He was warm under her hands but not flushed, unshaven and clearly unmoisturized. God, that shouldn’t have been a turn on. This was why she should never get up before noon.

Her touch seemed to unspool something in Quentin, because his lips suddenly parted against hers, his head tilting for a deeper kiss. He gripped her hips and then her ass, hauling her closer so she was perched right at the very edge of the counter, counting on him not to let her drop. Surprise was a tiny trapped moan in her throat, her body unexpectedly crushed against his, her fingers sliding into his hair and holding on _tight_. 

Eliot always had been annoyingly good at making predictions about people, but still. Little Quentin Coldwater, who knew?

Finally Margo shoved him back, more breathless than she planned on being. Her remaining mule was pressed resolutely to the center of his chest, the length of her leg between them. She kept herself from falling, but barely.

“Well,” Quentin said. “Good morning to you too.”

Margo snorted and then had to laugh, but the sound of it wasn’t quite right even though she went through the motions of tossing her head back in a charmingly insouciant way. She hopped down and righted the teddy that Quentin had managed to ruck up. “Eat your heart out, nerd,” she said, tousling his already-wrecked hair as she sashayed past him. 

Really, she should be praised for her restraint. She could have done a lot worse than that, and the thought made her instantly imagine all the _worse_ she could have done, all the ways she could have left Quentin in a sad little puddle on the kitchen floor, to be mopped up with magic. It was a nice start to the day, once she’d returned to bed and retrieved The Enchanted Vibrator (which she and Eliot had bonded over the creation of in their first year; they still had to trademark that shit). Under the cloud-like comfort of her duvet, she thought of how Quentin had grabbed her ass and wondered what other surprises he had up his sleeve. If he could have pulled himself together enough to whip up a little _worse_ himself.

(Though, let’s be real, he’d probably just come too fast and spend the rest of the year apologizing, unable to look her in the eye ever again.)

And that was where it ended. Because personally? She didn’t get attached.

**Author's Note:**

> Joke's on Margo!


End file.
